1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an image display processing apparatus, an image display processing method, and an information providing medium and, more particularly, to an image display processing apparatus, an image display processing method, and an information providing medium that allow efficient arrangement of a three-dimensional virtual reality space image and a plurality of windows for displaying accompanying information associated with this space by effective use of a display screen.
2. Description of Related Art
A cyberspace service named Habitat (trademark) is known in the so-called personal computer communications services such as NIFTY-Serve (trademark) of Japan and CompuServe (trademark) of US in which a plurality of users connect their personal computers via modems and public telephone network to the host computers installed at the centers of the services to access them in predetermined protocols. Development of Habitat started in 1985 by Lucas Film of the US, operated by Quantum Link, one of US commercial networks, for about three years. Then, Habitat started its service in NIFTY-Serve as Fujitsu Habitat (trademark) in February 1990. In Habitat, users can send their alter egos called avatars (the incarnation of a god figuring in the Hindu mythology) into a virtual city called Populopolis drawn by two-dimensional graphics to have a chat (namely, a realtime conversation based on text entered and displayed) with each other. For further details of Habitat, refer to the Japanese translation of “Cyberspace: First Steps,” Michael Benedikt, ed., 1991, MIT Press Cambridge, Mass., ISBN0-262-02327-X, the translation being published Mar. 20, 1994, by NTT Publishing, ISBN4-87188-265-9C0010, pp. 282-307.
In order to implement the above-mentioned cyberspace system by use of the infrastructure of the Internet through which information can be transferred all over the world, standardization of a three-dimensional graphics description language called VRML (Virtual Reality Modeling Language) is proceeding.
In WWW (World Wide Web) of the Internet, document data can be described in HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) and the resultant HTML file can be stored in a WWW server. This HTML file can be transferred on demand by a client terminal and can be displayed by use of the HTML browser of that client terminal.
Like this HTML file, three-dimensional graphics data can be described in VRML and the resultant VRML file can be stored in a WWW server. This VRML file can be transferred on demand by a client terminal and can be displayed by use of the VRML browser of that client terminal.
If, when a user who uses (mainly looks at) a three-dimensional virtual reality space through the above-mentioned VRML browser for example and is moving his or her avatar, meets an avatar of another user, the user can chat with another user.
For example, a chat service called Worlds Chat (trademark) developed by Worlds Inc. of US and made commercially available from April 1995 is used to make chat. This Worlds Chat supports chat in a three-dimensional virtual reality space based on the company's own standard, allowing a user to freely move in a virtual space of a fictitious space station to chat realtime in the form of text with another user in the space station.
In order to move avatars for enjoyment in such a three-dimensional virtual reality space, as many windows as possible must be displayed.
In the ordinary system, however, the display positions of windows are arranged to predetermined positions by a user with a mouse or the like, so that many windows cannot be efficiently displayed in a single limited screen. If a plurality of windows are displayed in such a single limited screen, the displayed windows overlap each other, thereby disabling the user to recognize an image of a window hidden under another.